The Bookmatcher: Dangerous Landscapes

imageWe’re starting a new feature here at Smart Bitch HQ. I was having a lively email conversation with Billie Bloebaum, who is the book buyer for Powell’s in the Portland airport, and she mentioned how much she enjoyed handselling books she knew were wonderpants but not as widely known as other more prominent bestselling pants.

I mentioned that I’d never had a bookstore employee handsell me a book in a store, and she about fell over. This handselling thing is an art, and with the consolidation of bookstores and the loss of smaller independents, it’s an endangered art. Some bookstore employees are incredibly good at matching your past reading history with newer books or undiscovered treasures. You sometimes find them at indies, and you can also find them at chain bookstores, too. People who are skilled at that art of matching a reader with books she’ll like are lurking among us, and Billie is one of them. Her favorite question: “What’s the last book you read that you really, really loved?”

So, to help her answer that question for more people, we’ve created The Bookmatcher. Folks have written in with their queries, and Billie will recommend books both inside and outside of the romance genre – we are a well-read readership, after all. It’s sort of like the “If you like…” features at DA and AAR, but more specific and more personal. If you’d like to ask for a Book Match, email me at sarahATsmartbitchestrashybooksDOTcom, with “Bookmatcher” in the subject line.

The links in this entry are all coded to Powell’s booksellers, as that’s where Billie works, and is one of the most awesomest independent booksellers.

On to our first query! This reader is not looking for a specific book, but a setting:

“I love books set in rural locales where the landscape is dangerous, and going off alone without preparation can kill you – like the frozen north, the exceptionally hot tropics, that kind of thing. I am not at all a big city fan.

But much of what I find set in, say, Alaska or the rural desolate American west is mystery or suspense. Is there anything else?”

Billie Bloebaum the Bookmatcher says: My first response is to steer this reader in the direction of one Ms. Julia Spencer-Fleming. [Her series begins with In the Bleak Midwinter.] They’re technically mysteries, but romance is at least as important to these novels as is the central crime.

Laura Kinsale loves to set parts of her books in inhospitable terrain—the Sahara (The Dream Hunter), the Amazon (The Hidden Heart), shipwrecked on a deserted island (Sieze the Fire), etc.

And, my personal guilty pleasure read (which I just recently re-read) Johanna Lindsey’s Silver Angel, though the actual landscape doesn’t play a huge role, it is set in a desert kingdom.

Tempest Rising CoverTempest Rising is a new “urban” fantasy that takes place in a small town in Maine.

And, of course Jill Shalvis’s Instant Attraction and the less-good Instant Gratification are set in a small mountain community, where lives are actually in jeopardy fairly frequently.


Thanks, Billie! I reviewed Instant Attraction back in January 2009, and In the Bleak Midwinter and A Fountain Filled With Blood earlier this year as well.

What books set in places where the landscape is deadly, inside and outside the romance genre, work for you? And have you ever had a bookseller handsell you a book that you loved?

 

Comments are Closed

  1. Kristina says:

    Estelle, I’m going to assume your a librarian?  I must applaude you and those in your field that take an interest in your patrons reading habits.  A very dear lady introduced me to Anita Blake and Harry Dresden (both characters, not authors) when I was in a Romance Novel slump. 

    I had been sighing frustratedly (sp?) in front of the romance shelf at my local library when she walked up to me and said “You look bored.  Let me show you something”  At first I was very skeptical cuz I thought vampire/horror/fantasy genre was tacky and silly.  But she dared me, gave me the first 5 Anita Blakes and said to let her know what I thought.  I was back a week later for the rest of them, she then handed me Harry Dresden and Weather Wardens.  I’ve been hooked ever since.  I wish she was still at that library, she would so be on my Christmas list.

    BTW, I do STILL love Anita Blake.  Just spent the whole summer reading ALL the her books (17 of them) in a row.  Gave me a fresh perspective on the story line and a new appreciation of what is thought to be a tired and dead series.  🙂

    Anywho, thanks for all you do Estelle!!  We the readers appreciate our librarians!!

    BTWx2:  I love Kelley Armstrong!!

  2. Rachel says:

    Not a romance, but Elizabeth Hay’s Late Nights On Air definitely fits the bill of dangerous location (frozen north in this case), and it’s a beautifully written book to boot. Awesome stuff! Above Reader should definitely try it. 🙂

  3. peyton says:

    Meg Cabot’s She Went All the Way started with hero and heroine getting stuck in Alaska without shelter. Then when they make it back to civilization, they go to LA. Another dangerous environment!

  4. Kate Pearce says:

    Not sure if this has already been posted but “Duncan’s Bride’ by Linda Howard is set in Montana and there are some very harrowing winter scenes in there.
    Also “Midnight Rainbow’ another Linda Howard which is hilarious and set mainly in a jungle.

    I’ve never been hand-sold a book, but I know of booksellers who have hand-sold mine and I love them dearly.

  5. Wow, thanks to Billie for remembering those books!  She really DOES know her stuff! 

    I have enjoyed writing books that demand a great deal of the characters, and often that can come from the environment.  I think my favorite was the desert in THE DREAM HUNTER, which almost becomes a character in itself, I think.

  6. Kalen Hughes says:

    I want to know when Billie is going to host an overnighter at Powell’s? I just want to bring a sleeping bag and roam those halls all night . . . though I’m terrified of what my MUST OWN stack would look like come morning, LOL!

  7. Becky says:

    On the Edge by Ann Aguirre

    I think this one was written by Ilona Andrews, not Ann Aguirre.  Or, at least, that’s the name it was published under.  I know Ilona Andrews is the pen name for a husband and wife team.  Maybe Ann is the wife half of that couple?  Anyway, I read this one not long ago and enjoyed it quite a bit.

  8. Amber says:

    Jasper Fforde was one of the authors I used to handsell quite frequently because his books crossed the genre restrictions.

    They are literary, they are sci-fi, they are mystery, they are romance.

    Authors I originally discovered via handselling include Janet Evanovich, JK Rowling, Jennifer Crusie, and Elizabeth Peters. All but Peters I started reading BEFORE they became NYT bestselling authors thanks to the booksellers who recommended them.

    To some extent, the indie bookstores MAY have someone who can handsell, but they’re also just as likely to employ people who only read literary fiction or non-fiction. At least, that’s the case with nearly every indie bookstore I’ve visited. They don’t carry and don’t read romance.

    I worked for Barnes and Noble for years (a big two level store) and we were trained to handsell. We had a list of which booksellers liked what genre. So if a bookseller who didn’t read Sci fi needed advice for a customer interested in that genre, he or she could hop on the phone and get recommendations from someone working in a completely different part of the store.

    We had also had a list similar to the one Sarah’s friend compiled. It was kept at the fiction area at all times.

    As for dangerous locales, they tend to lend themselves to romantic suspense or paranormal romance. Feehan has several set in Brazil. Kenyon’s Dance with the Devil takes place in Alaska. Roxanne St. Claire’s Make Her Pay takes place in the ocean off of Florida and in Portugal. And there a few of Suzanne Brockmann’s novels set in dangerous locales as well.

  9. Cat Marsters says:

    I’ve had great success recommending Terry Pratchett, Christopher Moore, Tom Holt, and Gideon Defoe to fans of Jasper Fforde.

    Since I’m a huge fan of Pratchett and also quite enjoyed Holt, I might look up the others.  Thanks!

    Incidentally, Jasper Fforde’s cousin-in-law is the chairman of the Romantic Novelists Association, Katie Fforde.

    BTW, someone mentioned the Dresden Files. Jim Butcher also writes the Codex Alera series, which is all-out fantasy set in a world where people can control the elements (fire, water, metal, wood, air and earth).  This quite literally makes the environment lethal, as watercrafters can smother you with water, aircrafters choke you, earthcrafters bury you, etc. He’s a very compelling storyteller (and a very nice man too: was anyone else lucky enough to spy him at one of the free signings—Penguin? Berkley?—at RWA Nationals?).

  10. I’ve worked at four bookstores in my life, two used and two new (Borders and Waldenbooks).  As a lifelong reader, it was my pleasure to introduce and/or recommend books to my customers.  In fact, while at Waldenbooks, I had two regular customers who simply told me to pick out books and they would buy them, one in Romance, the other a 11 year old boy who would come with his father the weekend after report cards came out to get Science Fiction books (from the adult section, not children). 

    It’s a heavy responsibility, but a wonderful way of passing the love along.  And I rarely recommended the big names, although there were exceptions.  I tended to go with the more obscure writers, the ones who got no respect from neither their publishers nor the bookstores.

  11. Duh, forgot to answer the question.  A romance set in a wild area has me thinking of a few authors right off the bat. 

    The first is Essie Summers.  Most of her books were set in the Outback of Australia.  She wrote sweet romances found in early Harlequin Romance series. 

    Some of Jennifer Blake’s books would be set in rough areas.  Her romances are old style with large dollops of history.

    Dorothy Garlock does frontier and turn of the century America novels.  Again has history and is rather tame in regards to romantic encounters.

    Tropical settings would definitely bring to mind Catherine Coulter, particularly her Viking series.

  12. I’m still thinking about recs for the original requester, but in the meantime I thought I’d take up Ros’ challenge. If she walked into my library & asked the same question, I’d start off by asking her what it is about Venetia that she loves: the banter? the unconventional romance? the quirky family?

    If it was the latter, I’d probably recommend The Flying Troutmans or The Spellman Files. If the banter, maybe some of Connie Willis’ “screwball SF” like Bellwether or To Say Nothing of the Dog. And for unconventional het romance, it’s hard to go wrong with Jennifer Crusie. Anyone But You could be a good starting point (also with the banter, BTW).

  13. Ria says:

    Eve Kenin’s was set in the future (?) in the frozen north. I liked the first one Driven better. http://www.evesilver.net/eve-kenin.html (I’m sorry I don’t know how to link directly)

  14. Castiron says:

    The only time I was ever handsold a book was by one of the folks at Adventures in Crime and Space back when they had a storefront.  BONITA FAYE by Margaret Moseley, indeed a worthwhile read—it has mystery elements, it has romance (though I wouldn’t necessarily call the ending a HEA, but it’s definitely hopeful), and it has rich and interesting characters.

  15. Nevada Barr’s Anna Pigeon books, set in various National Parks—mysteries rather than romance but with a great deal of relationship/kissy stuff.

  16. Kelly says:

    I know I should have read all 53 comments before adding my own, but…

    I was happy to see the other librarians speak up.  Reader’s advisory is my favorite part of being a librarian and I practice it on friends and family all the time.  🙂  It is important to figure out what about a book a person liked in order to help them properly.  Also, the best libraries have access to Novelist which has many read-a-like suggestions made by Nancy Pearl (librarian star) and other librarians. 

    As to exotic terrains, I’m thinking Maine doesn’t count, but I loved Marcia Evanick’s Misty Harbor series set in Maine where the winter was quite nasty.  And this is probably a terrible thing to do, but I’ll put out there Anne Stuart’s Ice series starting with Black Ice.  The reason it may be terrible is that I haven’t read them yet.  Definitely more romantic suspense.

  17. LG says:

    I had never actually heard of handselling before, but it makes sense – basically, the bookstore version of readers’ advisory.  I would guess that it’s slightly easier to do in a library environment than in a bookstore one, because there is absolutely nothing to lose in a library if you go with whatever you’re recommended.  I had a few people in my readers’ advisory class who were working in a bookstore at the time and practiced what they were learning on customers, so there are definitely still people out there outside of library environments doing that sort of thing.

  18. Michael says:

    I worked in a Waldenbooks for years before they closed.  Handselling was the name of the game.  I remember recommending Harlan Coben thrillers many times…..if only because he was the only suspense author I read.  At least he was good!

    Its a shame I didn’t read Romance when I worked there.  My store had numerous regulars who read over a dozen Romances a month.  Nowadays, I’d have tons to talk about with them.

  19. Jason Tipp says:

    It is really hard to believe for me that You can tell from the look of a person about his literacy preferences. Maybe there is something about that but I’m not convinced. But I can believe that selling hand to hand is something demanding. Sometimes there are so many good authors unknown to wider audience and they never get a chance to become as famous as some highschool-crappy titles.

  20. gypsydani says:

    hmmm…dangerous location immediately made me think of Sherry Thomas’ Not Quite a Husband.  i don’t have a recommendation for rural.  i’m a city girl and i like city stories and foreign locations.

    i’ve had a couple of clerks at Borders recommend books to me but that’s it.  there aren’t any non-Christian independent bookstores where i live.  so i have to survive off chains and the internet.  there aren’t even any good used bookstores with decent romance sections.  it makes me very sad.  where i used to live, there was a great used bookstore 5 minutes from my house.  i used to love going in there and swapping out my duds for new reading material.

    anyway, recommendations are the reason i haunt Smart Bitches and Dear Author, so i’m excited about the Bookmatcher.  i’ve got my booklist ready for new entries.

  21. quichepup says:

    The state of handselling in one chain bookstore: we’re told to handsell a particular title whether we’ve read it or not. Whether we like it or not, that’s the featured book and the store is supposed to sell X number of copies a week or we get in trouble with the corporate overlords. We can recommend books we know and like, but the featured book has to be in there first.

    I’m most comfortable in fiction, mystery and romance (now, thanks to the smartbitches) and now working my way through kids and YA, 2 of our biggest sections.

  22. HelenB says:

    Sort of on topic. Today I was in a Waterstones in Bury St Edmunds (UK) and spotted Elizabeth Hoyt, E Boyle, Jenna Petersen and Liz Carlyle in the erotia section! I asked why and one assistant told me that perhaps the person who shelved them did not know the difference between erotia and romance!! I took them off the shelf and told them to reshelve them in fiction along with Amanda Quick, Julia Quinn etc.

  23. Barbara says:

    I have to recommend three books from my teen years, two by Julian Thompson:
    The Grounding of Group Six
    A Question of Survival

    and one by Dennis Reader:
    Coming Back Alive

    They’re really YA books, and the Thompson ones are awfully creepy in premise 🙂

  24. BillieB says:

    I have to say I’m quite overwhelmed with the apparent success of this feature. I love anything that gets people talking to each other about books, and this has certainly done that.

    Also, a slight clarification: When I called ‘Instant Gratification’ less-good than ‘Instant Attraction’, that was in no way meant to imply that ‘Instant Gratification’ isn’t a good book and worth reading. It is. But, ‘Attraction’ was so very good that I’m afraid that the other books in the series are bound to be less so by comparison.

    My inner fangirl is squeeing a little over the fact that Laura Kinsale actually popped in to comment. (I’m at work, so I’m thankful the inner fangirl stayed inner.)

    And, Kalen, sorry, but I work at the Airport stores, so a lock-in would be cramped and sorta boring. Though the Hudson News is open all night, so we’d never run out of over-priced snack foods.

  25. gypsydani said

    hmmm…dangerous location immediately made me think of Sherry Thomas’ Not Quite a Husband.

    Thank you!  I was just about to recommend it myself.  Cuz how many romances take place in the Himalayas? 

    (Okay, so it was the Hindu Kush, but thereabout.)  🙂

  26. Lostshadows says:

    Don’t think I’ve been handsold to in an actual book store. I’ve had it happen in Comic Book stores, music stores, and once at a book stall at a gaming convention.

    While I can think of some books set in inhospitable climates that I’d recommend ; The Terror by Dan Simmons, Path of the Eclipse and Dark of the Sun both by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro; I wouldn’t classify them as romances.

    writing95-Probably. Now if I could just finish one. 🙂

  27. Sarah says:

    If your looking for some books that have intimidating or interesting landscapes, I would recommend reading some books by Australian authors (yeah, yeah, I know Im bias!). But the landscape here is often used symbolically/metaphorically. Remembering Babylon by David Malouf is incredible. And there series of books by John Marsden – the first is called tomorrow when the war began- which is aimed at a young adult audience but I loved them and much of the action takes place in the bush.

  28. Sarah says:

    Neither of them are romances though!

  29. ev says:

    When given half a chance at the bookstore I was very good at hand selling to customers. However, between budget and personnel cuts and a tyrannical manager, the fun of doing that went by the wayside. I know that I turned a lot of customers on to new authors over the years, and they likewise returned the favor. Which made hand selling all the more fun and not really a job at all.

  30. MB says:

    It may have been suggested already, but many if not most of Suzanne Brockmann’s book take place in hostile territory,—both the Troubleshooters series and the older Tall, Dark and Dangerous series.  See Wikipedia for booklists.  (The types of ‘hostile’ and ‘territory’ vary wildly in locale, threat, and temperature.

  31. Vassiliki says:

    Bookmatching is just part of a days job for most librarians working in a public library. And there are a number of courses and readers advisory (RA) tools that we use to do it. And the best thing is we do it because we love finding the right book for each individual borrower. My biggest buzz is when I get regulars coming in looking for me because I manage to satisfy their reading needs nearly every time. And my biggest challenge – a 14 year old girl who read voraciously and lurrrved romances. And my favourite RA tool? http://www.whichbook.net because it is all about how a book makes you feel.

    It’s good to see that there are still people in bookshops that handsell books. I’d imagine that it would be much harder to handsell when you need to turn a profit.

  32. Marla says:

    I recommend “Golden Urchin” by Madeleine Brent. An English girl is raised as an aborigine(?) in Australia’s outback, and later her wilderness survival skills come in to play in Africa. I loved the descriptions of her finding water underground, and making meatballs out of bugs.

  33. Marleen says:

    Sun at midnight by Rosie Thomas is a romance played out during an expedition to Antarctica. It certainly has the dangerous location, and there is not a bit of mystery or suspense in sight. It is very character-driven and wonderfully atmospheric.

    It’s British though, but I’m certain the wonderful Bookdepository sells it.

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